Komsomolskaya Pravda: "A trillion roubles to be spent on increased military salaries"
Vladimir Putin holds a government presidium meeting.
Opening a government presidium meeting yesterday, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin reminded those in attendance that the government has recently adopted a law on raising salaries for military personnel. In this context Putin asked Acting Finance Minister Anton Siluanov about the status of the legislation required for new payments. Siluanov reported that the budget provides for the necessary allocations for 2012 and 2013.
"We have earmarked an additional sum of more than one trillion roubles on increasing military salaries and paying military pensions," he said.
Then Putin addressed his First Deputy Viktor Zubkov: "We have a big harvest this year (thank God!), but there are some questions about this, such as agricultural produce pricing and shipment, mainly of grain. What can you tell us about this?"
"This year production has grown considerably – we have 97 million tonnes of grain and 48 million tonnes of sugar beets," Zubkov reported.
This beet harvest is really unprecedented and compares favourably with about 20 million tonnes last year.
Zubkov said it would allow Russia to stop importing next year and even have enough to export sugar. Cargo shipments have generally improved.
Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov spoke about subsidised flights to Moscow and St Petersburg for the residents of the Kaliningrad Region.
"I must say this programme was not in much demand. At any rate, it's not as effective as the one for the Far East," Putin remarked.
He said there were proposals to extend this benefit not only to young people and pensioners but to all residents of the Kaliningrad Region regardless of age.
Zhukov replied that these proposals had been drafted. Any resident of the Russian enclave will be entitled to a discounted fare from May 15 to September 15.
"There is one more important change – previously we had a fixed fare (3,600 roubles to Moscow) but now this will be the maximum fare," Zhukov said. "The airlines will start competing for passengers in order to get the subsidies and lower it even further than this maximum rate. We expect that about 200,000 residents of Kaliningrad will buy these discounted tickers next year."
"Let's try it," Putin agreed.
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Apropos
Yesterday Prime Minister Vladimir Putin also held a meeting on state defence orders.
"About 750 billion roubles have been allocated from the federal budget this year for the purchase and modernisation of equipment and arms and for military research, which is 50% more than in 2010," Putin recalled. "The figure for 2012 is even higher – we have earmarked more than 880 billion roubles for this purpose. Such huge allocations to re-equip the army and navy have never been made in the history of modern Russia before."
To make sure the funds are spent properly and the contracts fulfilled on schedule, Putin ordered the creation of a special group at the military-industrial commission to monitor costs and contract fulfillment. It will include representatives from the Defence Ministry, the Tariff Service, the Finance Ministry and the Ministry of Industry and Trade.
Maxim Brusnev
